Gagne latest with ‘unbreakable’ record

More than any other sport, major league baseball is infatuated with streaks.

The NFL has Brett Favre and his 208 consecutive starts (including playoffs), and Johnny Unitas’ touchdown passes in 47 straight games. Golfer Byron Nelson won 11 tournaments in a row in 1945. All impressive. But is there any streak more noteworthy, more glamorous than Joe DiMaggio hitting safely in 56 straight games for the New York Yankees in 1941?

If there is, it’s the Orioles’ Cal Ripken Jr. and his streak of 2,632 consecutive games from 1982 to 1998.

Some believe Los Angeles Dodgers pitcher Orel Hershiser’s 59 straight scoreless innings in 1988 are just as notable. And if all you need for a streak is two, Cincinnati’s Johnny Vander Meer tossed back-to-back no-hitters in 1938.

Now there is a new number, 84, the consecutive saves amassed by Eric Gagne before the streak ended Monday night. Gagne, the Los Angeles Dodgers’ big, bespectacled relief pitcher, went nearly two years without blowing a save until the Arizona Diamondbacks erased a 5-3 lead in the ninth inning.

Los Angeles won in the 10th, but that was secondary to the streak landing on a final number, a number that now becomes etched in history and figures to hang around for a while.

“I think it will last a long, long time,” ESPN commentator and former reliever Jeff Brantley said. “It’s a very difficult job. Especially to be consistent day in and day out, on days you may not have it. You still have to get ’em out.”

The streaks of DiMaggio, Ripken, Hershiser and Vander Meer are likely to last a long, long time, too, if not forever. And there are others:

• New York Giants pitcher Carl Hubbell won 24 games in a row in 1936-37.

• Dale Long of the Pittsburgh Pirates homered in eight straight games in 1956, a record tied by Don Mattingly (1987) and Ken Griffey Jr. (1993).

• Tom Seaver of the New York Mets struck out 10 straight batters in a game in 1970.

• Dodgers pitcher Don Drysdale pitched six straight shutouts in 1968.

• Washington Senators ace Walter Johnson pitched at least 300 innings in a season nine years in a row.

And on and on.

Many streaks and records like Johnson’s are products of the times and remain impenetrable. “There are things that won’t be broken now because the game isn’t played that way anymore,” statistics guru Steve Hirdt said.

“But with DiMaggio’s record, the game hasn’t been changed.”

Ah, DiMaggio, the Cadillac of streaks. Of the streaks not affected by the game’s alterations, this one seems most likely to endure.

“That’s because every player has been eligible to hit in 56 games in row, and nobody ever has,” said Hirdt, executive vice president of Elias Sports Bureau. “I think if they play baseball long enough somebody will break that record, but I think it will be a long time in coming.”

Hirdt believes if enough games are played, every record can theoretically fall, every streak can be topped. It’s like saying that enough monkeys typing in a room eventually will produce Shakespeare.

“If it was humanly possible once, it can happen again,” Orioles first baseman Rafael Palmeiro said.

“Joe DiMaggio’s record is doable,” Orioles outfielder B.J. Surhoff said. “It takes eight great weeks. Do I think it will be done? No. But if I was a betting guy and I was betting which one would go down, that has a better chance than breaking Cal’s record.”

But noted baseball historian John Thorn said, “The one record that seems to be outside all statistical norms is DiMaggio’s hitting streak. No one has come close, before or after.”

DiMaggio’s 56 straight obliterated the previous record, 44 by Wee Willie Keeler. Pete Rose, the all-time hits leader, mounted the most serious challenge to DiMaggio in 1978. But all Rose could do was tie Keeler.

Hershiser?

“That’s pretty good, but I think it can be defeated,” said Thorn, whose works include the voluminous Total Baseball. “The thing that makes me believe it can be duplicated and surpassed is that it barely surpassed Don Drysdale [58[1/3] straight scoreless innings in 1968], who only barely surpassed Walter Johnson [56 straight in 1913].”

Even the Ripken streak is not unassailable, according to Hirdt.

“That streak is so different,” he said. “For two reasons. He decided to do it, and he had a manager willing to let him do it. I think it could be equaled if anyone early in his career decided that’s what he wanted to do.”

Tampa Bay Devils Ray coach Don Zimmer, who has been in the game more than 50 years, disagreed.

“If I had to pick one record [that will last] it would be Cal Ripken,” Zimmer said. “They say DiMaggio’s hit streak and so on. Cal Ripken, to me, is the greatest of all streaks.

“You give guys nights off when it gets hot. Some guys can play through injuries, some guys can’t. This guy has done something no one will do again.

“Today, you get a save with three outs, and [Gagne] did it 80-some times. That’s a tremendous record, but I don’t think it ranks up there with Ripken’s.”

Thorn said Gagne’s streak might go unchallenged because he bested the previous longest saves streak by 30. But the entire subject of saves becomes the focus of debate and controversy. Hirdt and Thorn, among others, are somewhat appalled with how relievers accumulate saves — and it was Hirdt who refined the qualifications.

The contention is that not only is it easy to get a save (pitching one inning with a three-run lead can do it), but that managers are making sure their closers only pitch in save situations, even if the game is tied in the ninth inning. Most closers have clauses in their contracts that reward them for saves. Managers, the feeling goes, are only too happy to comply.

But, Hirdt said, “I have great respect for what Gagne has done. He did it 84 times in row, and he was being used no differently from the way any other relief pitcher was being used.”

“The save is an elective strategy,” Thorn said. “It’s contingent on which manager you play for. Some relievers get more save opportunities than others.”

Although Thorn said he “devalues” the saves streak, he still believes Gagne is a “fabulous pitcher.”

“But not because of this cockamamie record,” Thorn said. “He’s fabulous because his strikeouts-to-innings and hits-to-innings ratios are the best in baseball. He is clearly phenomenal in what he does.”

• Staff reporter Ben Goessling contributed to this article.